Lots of Love for the Schermerhorn House
The Schermerhorn is not your average affordable housing project, as The Times makes abundantly clear in its profile this weekend. (As we put it a couple of weeks ago, “This place is about as sexy as supportive housing gets.”) Stand-out amenities include a gym with floor-to-ceiling windows and a ground-floor performance space. (The Brooklyn Ballet…
The Schermerhorn is not your average affordable housing project, as The Times makes abundantly clear in its profile this weekend. (As we put it a couple of weeks ago, “This place is about as sexy as supportive housing gets.”) Stand-out amenities include a gym with floor-to-ceiling windows and a ground-floor performance space. (The Brooklyn Ballet will be the anchor tenant.) Designed by Polshek Partnership Architects, the 217-unit building will end up being split fairly evenly between arts-related professionals who don’t make a lot of dough and those who qualify for supportive housing, typically the formerly homeless and others in need of help. The interior photo in The Times story is pretty darn slick for this type of thing, seeming to confirm our suspicions that lack of creativity and resourcefulness is usually more to blame than small budgets when ugly new buildings are put up.
New Homes for a Varied Cast [NY Times]
Schermerhorn House 1/3-Rented [Brownstoner]
Development Watch: Schermerhorn House Nears Completion [Brownstoner]
Development Watch: Schermerhorn House Gets Its Skin [Brownstoner] GMAP
Development Watch: 160 Schermerhorn Tops Out [Brownstoner] P*Shark
Development Watch: Schermerhorn House Rising [Brownstoner] DOB
Some More 411 on the “Schermerhorn House” [Brownstoner]
oooooooh burn :-/
not
*rob*
“and i will rally against it the best way i can.”
Yeah, right. You’re not going to do anything but talk sh#t about it on this blog. You’re a quitter and a sore loser who’s focusing his frustration on others because you don’t have what it takes to get things done yourself. You’re a joke.
omg slope, what is your point? i am very pro art i just find it blah. big deal! and my version of art is very different than a lot of people peoples.
*rob*
> “and i am VERY VERY VERY VERY VERY pro-arts.”
This from the guy who, just last week, said the Brooklyn Museum sucked, and that he did not care about art.
LOL.
I don’t understand the never ending need to begrudge people some small emenities in life. “They” always seem to be out there, getting things “we” really wouldn’t want or need or even use, but there is always that resentment that someone out there is getting something they shouldn’t. It just isn’t FAIR!
First of all, the problem with the way we see “the arts” is severely colored by the small 5% of actors, dancers, painters, sculptors, directors, and administrators, etc, etc who are sucessful, famous and wealthy. That’s five percent. The remaining 95% range the gamut from making a good living down to destitute, with most arts people on the lower end of the scale. The arts affect all of our lives. I’m not just talking about movies or tv, but everything from our packaging to the internet itself, to popular and world culture, to museums and street fairs. The work of the arts is everywhere, and without it, we would have a society as culturally nurturing as the Taliban.
More importantly to this discussion, so what if they have a gym? So what if someone gets a break and can move into a studio smaller than half a subway car? Why begrudge them? There are lots of people walking around who are “luckier” than I am, and got opportunities and advantages I never had, and plenty of people out there who aren’t as smart as I am, or perhaps as deserving as I may feel I am, who have things I would like to have. Boo hoo. Even the worst off of us on this blog are privileged compared to most of the world, we should stop being envious of people who have things we don’t really even want, and we should concentrate on bettering ourselves, by ourselves. We are all capable of making our futures better.
Someone who hasn’t had a break in life, or is working like a dog in an underfunded, unappreciated, but necessary field of any kind, from assistant to the assistant gaffer, to a local theatre company office worker, to a home care attendant making minimum wage with a 60 hour week, deserves a helping hand. If a group chooses to help them, chooses to build a building to house them, chooses to give that building a few amenites, and an attractive design, then God bless them, and God bless the recipients. Would that more could help and be helped. That’s what we’re supposed to be doing, especially now.
crimon that doesnt even make sense. excuuuuuuse me for having a differing opinion about what it means to be an artist, hand-outs, and life style.
personally i think ex reality tv show contestants should have their own subsizided building then. why stop there!? how about out of work ex child actors?
like i said it’s unfair that just because someone works in an industry tangentially related to the arts gets a subsidy then say a bartender, hair dresser, or drug store clerk making the same amount of money.
if people really are invested in the arts they will find a way to persue their art. yeah id LOVE to have a cheap ass subsidized new construction apartment so i can persue something creative too! why not!
and i am VERY VERY VERY VERY VERY pro-arts. but i am very VERY VERY VERY VERY against this building. and i will rally against it the best way i can.
*rob*
BTW – nice way to trivialize being an artist
“real artists create stuff, they dont expect handouts”
Maybe you should drop your current job and pursue the arts fully if you really want to live here?
there are plenty of other buildings with apts where rent is pegged to income if you qualify and don’t have to be in’arts’.
So if qualify – go apply.
“i guess it just proves that even the homeless need to work out.”
If they live here, they’re not longer homeless.
“otherwise they wouldn’t be “artists” and get a job that pays more.”
What’s your excuse?